By Adriana Alarcón (Written for MakerZone)
All schemes of cooperation and economic integration of states, such as customs unions, regional integrations, or political communities, are presumed to be aspirational, and rightly so, as part of a democratic process. Whereas, for the states themselves, this means only economic power. Strategically, there is today a contradiction between the democratizing trend and the anti-democratic thrust of economic policy reflected in institutions such as NATO, the IMF, the European Union.
Democracy is not only political but also cultural and economic. In the economy, the need of the moment is for large-scale institutional changes, for great democratic transformations. The real problem today is not state ownership versus privatization but democratization. Forcing political situations in the region to promote coups d'état, disguised as democracy, as K.J. Holsti mentions in the text "Exceptionalism in American Foreign Policy: Is it exceptional? is the evolution of the Truman Doctrine, backed by the US rhetoric of freedom and democracy.
Also, within these states or institutions officials, such as the IMF, fail to explain the precise reasons for the conditions attached to loans or fail to explain the assumptions (and doubts) behind programs aimed at key objectives such as restoring the external financial viability of an entire national economy. The result is a major scope for intervention from the principal shareholders, leading the Fund to a forced optimism during the design of the program, which in turn negatively affects the quality (and effectiveness) of its programs.
Similarly, the relationship that other countries have built around financial institutions, with the IMF and World Bank, has been one of pure economic dependence, unequally, with constant loans, creating winners and losers, which weakens the democratic processes. It is through these supposedly "democratic" institutions where they seek to create a global state, which according to Wim Dierckxsens, Dr. in Social Sciences from the University of Nijmegen, Holland and Walter Formento, professor at the National University of La Pampa and the National University of La Plata:
"Tends to take the place of mass political parties, with its organs, its legal system of material and intellectual property".
Therefore, it is necessary to ask the following question: What does it mean for democratization if the improvement of the economy comes at the price of a more disconnected or even disaffected electorate? That is why any conception of privatization, such as that of the IMF, leaves out of consideration the interest of the vast majority of society and must therefore be resisted. Privatization, IMF style, is undemocratic. And as Theotonio Dos Santos says, it seeks to restrict the fullness of the democratic ideal to the simulacra of democracy because it is a democracy based on consumption.
Sources:
Dierckxsens, W., Formento, W. (2015). La batalla de los imperios financieros por el mundo ¿Un mundo en transición histórica?. Retrieved on: https://biblat.unam.mx/hevila/MundosigloXXI/2016/no38/1.pdf
Dos Santos, Theotonio (2016): “La Ofensiva del Gran Capital y las Amenazas para América Latina” en Nicolás Trotta y Pablo Gentili: América Latina. La Democracia en la Encrucijada, Buenos Aires: CLACSO. Retrieved on: https://www.teseopress.com/encrucijadasabiertas/chapter/58/
Kapur, D., Naím, M. (2005) The IMF and Democratic Governance. Retrieved on: https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/the-imf-and-democratic-governance/
Holsti K.J (2010) Exceptionalism in American foreign policy: Is it exceptional? Retrieved on: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1354066110377674?journalCode=ejta#
Comments